Sydney is home of the famous Sydney Opera House, and the largest, oldest and most cosmopolitan city in Australia. The Harbor City, as it is known, is filled with history, nature, art, culture, fashion and design set next to long stretches of coastline and sandy beaches home to surfers from around the world.

Sydney is a sprawling city, and the suburbs in the city metropolitan area spread for up to 100km from the city centre. The traveller visiting the suburbs will find less crowded beaches, parks, cheaper shopping, commercial centres, cultural festivals, and hidden gems.

The city of Sydney is built on hills surround Port Jackson, commonly known as Sydney Harbor.

Visitors will not want to miss nearby Bondi Beach and Manly Beach. Within the city itself are many beautiful parks, including Hyde Park and the Royal Botanical Gardens. Sydney was home to the 2000 Olympics and often plays host to various world sports events.

Sydney has a temerate climate with warm summers and mild winters. Rainfall is spread throughout the year. The weather is moderated by proximity to the ocean, and more extreme temperatures are recorded in the inland western suburbs. The warmest month is January, with an average air temperature range at Observaatory Hill of 18.6–25.8 °C (65–78 °F). An average of 14.6 days a year have temperatures of more than 30 °C(86.0 °F).

As the financial and economic hub of Australia, Sydney has grown to become a wealthy and prosperous city. The largest economic sectors in Sydney, as measured by the number of people employed, include property and business services, retail, manufacturing, and health and community services.

Sydney is one of the most cosmopolitan cities on the planet, with one third of its population born overseas. European settlement rapidly displaced the Aboriginal people of the Sydney area with colonists largely coming from England, Ireland and Scotland. The Australian goldrush attracted more immigrants, including a significant number of Chinese, with about one in four Australians with convict descent also having some Chinese ancestry.

In the early 20th century, Sydney continued to attract immigrants - mostly from the U.K. and Ireland, with the White Australia Policy preventing non-European peoples (and even Southern Europeans) from settling. Australia's immigration patterns, and consequently, that of Sydney, changed significantly after WWII, when migrants began to arrive from countries as diverse as Italy, Greece, Germany, Holland, China, New Zealand, India, the Philippines, Poland, Lebanon, Iraq, Vietnam, Thailand, South Africa and the Pacific Islands. Sydney's culture, food and general outlook well reflect these contributions to the majority Anglo-Celtic institutions and social establishment.